ALL
ROADS ARE HIS

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Meeting
Jesus on the Common Street

Widow of Nain

She lived down the
street from us. Trying to make ends meet with her baked goods and her
simple stitchery. Six years the husband had been gone. That awful
accident at the building site. The week of lingering and the night of
the terrible storm when her childhood sweetheart breathed his
last.

Their son had been twelve years old when he lost his
father and the much needed male influence. In the intervening years
he had few friends, no known romance and a string of short-term jobs
to help his mother. It had seemed to her that a new household and
laughing grandchildren were dreams incapable of fruition.

Then
fever visited, and the youth with his irregular work schedules, poor
diet and meager build proved a ready target. He came home wheezing
and lasted only two days.

The neighbours, my husband included,
had arranged the funeral bier, the rabbi's attendance and the simple
gathering of respect for one so little known. Oh, but he was still
the hope and treasure of his mother. To the rest of us women her
brave silence in the procession was almost more pathetic than an open
flood of grief.

At the end of the street and before turning to
the place of meeting, we noticed a tall fetching man in the company
of several friends. He laid his hands on the shoulders of two of his
comrades and turned to us. With eyes confident, clear and piercing he
faced the bereaved woman whispering, "Weep not."

Asking
for no permission, he approached the body and touched the bier upon
which it lay, "Young man, I say unto thee arise."

Imagine
our shock when we saw the head move and the eyes register
recognition, the lips a smile and some words of reassurance to his
mother. Alive again! What strange power? What divine sympathy had
come to bless our village, a delicate lad and one poor lonely
woman?

This man, Jesus, so masterful and compassionate. The
mother's dreams revived.